Abstract
UNESCO‘S Hylean Amazon Project, since its inception two years ago,has been sustained by World-wide reached its climax when delegates of interested nations agreed at Iquitos, Peru, last May that the International Institute of the Hylean Amazon should be established. Extending from the Andes to the Atlantic and from the River Orinoco to the Mountains of Bolivia, the Hylean Amazon—the vast wooded region of the Amazon River basin—is some seven million square kilometres in area. Except for a few towns and settlements, mainly along the river banks, the only inhabitants of this region are about three hundred thousand Indians, whose conditions of life in many cases are extremely primitive. The density of population of the region is one of the lowest in the world. The new Institute will study the problems of botany, zoology, physiography, agriculture, social sciences and education in relation to that area. The project for the creation of an international research institute in the Hylean Amazon has been inspired by the past history of the region. Since the discovery of Amazonia, it has been explored by scientific missions of many nationalities with the aim of drawing up its botanical and zoological inventory, of becoming acquainted with the state of social development and organisation of its native tribes, of determining the essential characteristics of its climate and soil, of carrying out archaeological excavations and finally of opening up the economic wealth and exploring the demographic possibilities of its vast area.
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International Institute of the Hylean Amazon. Nature 163, 15 (1949). https://doi.org/10.1038/163015c0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/163015c0
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